Teesside knife crime campaigners hopes future Government passes law
The future of the Criminal Justice Bill is in doubt
Campaigners in Teesside are hoping the future Government will pass new knife crime laws as Parliament dissolves today.
The future of the Criminal Justice Bill, which includes a ban on so-called zombie knives, is in doubt because of the general election.
Theresa Cave, Chief Executive of the Chris Cave Foundation in Redcar, in memory of her son who was stabbed to death in 2003, said: "I'm a bit worried about it to be honest with you. I think it should have been brought into fruition before now. They should have made an issue of rushing it through especially with the state the country's in at the minute with knife crime.
"I'm not banking on it because when the new Government gets in, I believe that they'll have more important issues to deal with laying laws out, and I think the zombie knives will be pushed to the bottom of the barrel. I really do hope I'm wrong because it just means another campaign for us if it does happen that way. We can do without having to campaign and beg all the time.
"I have no doubt that people will take to the streets again to campaign outside of Downing St. like they did before many years ago, but when you think about it this promise was made two to three years ago to my knowledge and before this had come out, I honestly thought they had already been banned because of what was said a couple of years ago. I got a shock when I found out they hadn't actually been banned yet.
"It's been 21 years for Chris and I've been waiting for 21 years for them to realise this. I don't think they realise anything until it happens to one of their own and then things will be put in motion. It always happens that way. It's sad to have to say that but that's how it is.
"It's a war. They're sending young people out to be slaughtered literally, young people are slaughtering other people and other people are slaughtering each other and it's just mayhem. It's a pandemic now. They need really to get heads together and sit down with people like us and say what can be done because they've yet to do that.
"We need some positive action around knife crime and until they do that, it's not going to stop. They need to get some funding out there for organisations to do more work. You've got to remember that most of these organisations, like myself especially, we don't get a penny. We don't get paid anything. We're going the work because we want to do the work, we want to make changes and we want to change mindsets."